


Far Too Poisoned

by Krasimer



Series: Terrible Truths (Secrets Long Held) [2]
Category: The Cabin in the Woods (2011)
Genre: Backstory, F/F, F/M, Plans For The Future, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-10-24
Packaged: 2019-08-07 01:01:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16398443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krasimer/pseuds/Krasimer
Summary: There have always been sacrifices.Going far back into history, there has always been the Ritual.(From 1949 to 1966 to 1975 -- Three of the most historically significant Rituals.)





	Far Too Poisoned

**_1949_ **

There’d been a moment, in the peace before the nightmares, where she’d wanted to tell her friends to stop.

That had been before the basement, before the sensation of floating out of her mind, before the woods, before the cabin. She’d wanted to tell them to stop but her mouth had been locked shut, only able to giggle at the darkness with her friends at her sides. Dorothy had simply laughed the loudest, picking her way through the crowded basement.

Her hands had dragged gently over the items, her mouth curled into a red-lipsticked smirk as she looked back over her shoulder. “Come on!” she’d called back to them. “They’re only someone’s old things!”

Dorothy had always been the bravest.

The one to flirt with the boys, to march right up to them and touch and laugh and flash her teeth in a sharp smile. There were rumors about her, in town, but she never paid them any nevermind. Her skirt was pulled an inch too high when she could get away with it, she often wore trousers when she could get them. Dorothy had been brave and beautiful and bold, the strongest girl that Henrietta had ever known.

And then she had picked up the strange cards, glancing over them for a second before settling them back.

Her hands had grabbed the necklace before she’d even seemed aware of what she’d been doing. The others, her sister and their cousin, Henrietta’s sister, Henrietta herself, had all been poking and prodding at the ‘treasures’, talking about which ones they’d seen.

But Dorothy had picked up the necklace in a trance of some sort. It had gone over her head and settled onto her neck without a problem, almost like it belonged there. The dress on the dummy was an off-white color, aged fabric in the darkness, and Henrietta had watched as it began to glow.

Within minutes, Dorothy had been _gone._

Behind her eyes had been someone else, someone Henrietta hadn’t grown up next door to. Someone who wasn’t brave and bold and beautiful Dorothy.

Someone who had ripped the other girls apart and left Henrietta where she was currently: walking on the side of the road, her dress ripped and ruined, her shoes practically in tatters. There were bloodied claw marks on her arms, tear stains down her cheeks, and her hair was clumped oddly, blood-soaked. Dorothy had been a vision in that wedding gown, a vengeful bride that had screamed so loud that Annabelle had nearly gone deaf from it.

Annabelle hadn’t lived long enough to complain about it overly much.

She’d been set upon by her cousin, in the seconds after the scream left her lips. It had been the second day of their trip when Dorothy had gone insane.

Eunice, Dorothy’s sister, had been next.

And then it had been Harriet, Henrietta’s sister, and Henrietta had been left to face Dorothy’s madness alone.

The Bride, as she had muttered when Henrietta had asked. For some reason, the Bride had left her alive, cold fingers that felt like nothing but bone trailing down her cheek. Dorothy had been gone, at that point, almost nothing left of the girl she’d been friends with since they’d been toddlers.

Henrietta shivered, tugging the ragged edges of her sweater closer and hunching against the wind.

Either she was going to find a way home or she was just going to die out here.

She wasn’t sure which one she wanted.

 

X

 

**_1966_ **

Her brother’s eyes stared back at her from the floor.

Angela cupped her hands over her mouth, doing her best to muffle her crying. Off in the distance, she could hear the horrifying giggles of the goddamn clown, following the screams of her friend Rachel. It had appeared in the cabin and Kevin had tried to get the guy to leave.

That had been when they’d thought that _thing_ was a person.

It had left, easily enough, but it had lurked outside the windows all night, giggling and tapping on the glass. That had been nerve-wracking enough, but then the phones hadn’t worked. An old cabin, Danielle had told them, belonging to her great-uncle. The poles might have been knocked down or the weather might have ruined the line—

Or the clown might have cut the wires.

Danielle’s boyfriend, Andy, had gone back to the car to get something, she didn’t even remember what anymore, and he hadn’t come back. He’d been the first to die.

(Privately, a part of her felt that he deserved it, for cheating on Danielle so often.)

Danielle had gone looking for him.

She’d found him on the ground, with the clown looming over him. There had been a knife in the thing’s hand.

Pursued by the clown, she’d come running back to the cabin. She hadn’t been quick enough, hadn’t been strong enough to keep the door closed against the threat. It had gotten inside and Danielle’s skin might as well have been tissue paper. The knife had gone through her as if there’d been no resistance.

Kevin had been the one to drag her out of the room.

They’d only had seconds, but he’d pushed her into the rafters and told her to stay quiet, turning and charging towards the clown to keep her safe. He’d had his camera tripod in his hands, using it a little bit like a spear as he snarled at the clown to leave.

The thing had lashed out at him with the knife, scoring a line across his chest and forcing him back.

Kevin had fought _back_. He’d planted his feet and struck out with the tripod and put it _through the thing’s **chest**_ and that still hadn’t been enough to stop it. The creature, whatever it was that decided looking like a clown was great fun, had only cackled that hideous laughter and stabbed him until she’d heard something pop.

If she lived through this, she was going to remember that noise for the rest of her life. The sound of the knife plunging into flesh and ripping out again, the scrape of metal against flesh and bone.

If she lived, she was going to be a vegetarian.

Her brother was gone. Kevin, the photography and film student, who’d made a short film that had gotten an award from a small festival. The same Kevin that had walked her home every single day from school, keeping her safe from the bullies and anyone else who might have tried to hurt her. Kevin, her big brother, and her best friend, and the only person she’d had left after their parents had died.

His eyes were staring up at her, cold and empty, and she clamped her hands harder over her mouth, muffling a sob only halfway.

Rachel’s screams had gone silent.

Angela trembled as she glanced towards the window. Surely the nightmare would end when the sun rose? Darkness fled in the presence of the dawn, surely it would end the reign of terror brought about by a thing that looked like a clown?

She cursed the stupid fortune telling machine they’d found in the basement. Andy had been the one to find it first, but Rachel had been the one to press the button to turn it on. They’d laughed at the stupid puppet inside of it, croaking voice saying something vague and sort of creepy. They’d never even thought about it being dangerous – Why would they? It was a fortune telling machine, they’d found them at carnivals before. Danielle had been the most excited, had declared she wanted it for her bedroom.

They’d worked together to haul the damned thing up the stairs from the basement.

When she heard the footsteps coming back into the room, she whimpered and trembled, already knowing that she wouldn’t be saved.

The clown, dripping blood onto the floor, stood directly beneath her, giggling and grinning. The thing waved the knife it held like it was saying hello. Angela felt her tears burning tracks down her face as she shook her head. The clown- _thing_ nodded.

Without any time between changes, the clown suddenly seemed bigger, simply reaching up and curling gloved fingers around her ankle.

The second-to-last thing Angela Mayhew thought, as she was pulled from her perch, was that her brother’s body had gone an awful sort of pale, his blood spilled out on the floor around him. The absolute last thing she thought was even worse.

There would be no one to bury them.

 

X

 

**_1975_ **

The music seemed to follow her.

Her friends were only blood splatters across the wall now, the music drifting through the air as the thing that looked almost like a little girl danced between their remains. Instead of a face, she had rows and row of teeth, gums a blood-red color. Her open mouth looked like a wound.

Donna shuddered as she continued to peek out of the cabinet she was hiding in.

Somehow, the creature hadn’t found her.

The music box had to have summoned whatever this thing was. They’d been playing with the things in the basement, pieces of history that Shawna had been ecstatic over. The antique wedding dress, the old Vaudeville act, ancient toys and tools, and clothes. Things that hadn’t seen the light of day for decades, if not centuries.

Shawna had been _entranced._

Tammy had found the music box, though.

Richard and Tammy had argued back and forth about it, with Richard eventually taking it from her and winding it himself. They’d continued to snipe at each other until the music had filled the room, more beautiful than anything else they’d ever heard.

From the roiling in her gut, Donna had felt uneasy about it.

The cabin had been a graduation gift from Michael’s uncle, a place for them to go to celebrate as a group of friends before they headed off to different schools and different cities. One last week together before their lives got so full and complicated that they couldn’t see each other anymore.

Now it felt like a curse.

A tomb.

The music filled the building, the little thing that looked like a girl continuing to dance among the wreckage of bodies. She never once got blood on her shoes.

Donna didn’t know how long she slept in the cabinet. All she knew was that, when she woke up, there were people in the building. With a sob of relief, she pushed open the door and rolled out of it, landing heavily on her knees and looking around. The people who’d arrived were wearing big, bulky suits, completely hiding whoever they might have been. She wrinkled her nose at the acrid scent of cleaning products.

The bodies of her friends were gone.

With a couple of final whispers, the chatter in the room went silent as the sound of high heels against the wooden floor echoed throughout. The crowd parted and Donna looked up to see a woman walking towards her, her hands clasped behind her back. “Your name is Donna Williamson.” She spoke in a clear, commanding voice. “You’ve survived an unimaginable horror.”

She held out a hand. “My name is Henrietta Avedon. I am the Director.”

“Um,” Donna swallowed, taking her hand. Henrietta helped pull her to her feet. “My friends—”

“It is unfortunate, but there was a necessity to it.” Henrietta sighed. “There are many things you do not know, Donna. Seeing as you’ve survived, I would say you have a right to know them.” She gestured around the room, then turned and started walking towards the door, still holding Donna’s hand. “Come, speak with me.”

“My stuff—”

“Will still be there when we’re are done.” Henrietta glanced at her. “You are the only one who stayed at this cabin, Donna. Remember that.”

For a moment, Donna could only think of the way those circular rows of teeth had practically drilled through Richard’s neck. The way Tammy had died, screaming and naked, as she tried to run from the nightmare that had arrived in the main room. Of Shawna, who had been so fascinated with trying to identify what eras the items in the basement had come from.

She thought about Michael, who’d been her best friend for what seemed like an eternity, who had died trying to keep the monster away from where she’d been hidden.

“I was the only one staying at the cabin,” she nodded when Henrietta continued to look at her. “I needed some time off before I continued on to college.”

“Very good,” Henrietta’s smile was dangerous. “Now. How would you like a job?”

“A job?”

“This was all part of a ritual, Donna. The price is youth and beauty and we feed young lives to the nightmares to keep the world from ending.” Henrietta pulled her to a halt, in front of two chairs that had been set up on the ground outside. “If we do not do what we do, an ancient force will rise and destroy our world.”

Donna mulled over that, sitting when Henrietta motioned for her to. “So why tell me?”

“Because you’re a survivor,” Henrietta’s eyes flashed with something for a second. “Just like I was. Because you’re still here and had the intelligence to find a way to avoid the dangers. Because,” she was sitting as well, now, and she held up an arm. Pulling back her sleeve, she revealed a scar that looked like someone had clawed their fingers across her skin. “I am getting tired. So I would like to offer you a job.” She smiled. “My job.”

Looking at the scar, Donna felt something in her chest going tight.

If she’d been told this at any point before today, she would have called the person telling it a loon.

Instead, she only nodded. “What does that mean for me?”

Henrietta’s smile grew wider and she took Donna’s hands. “You’re going to save the world,” she whispered. “That’s what you always have to tell yourself. It’s the only way it will work, for you. The only way you’ll be able to justify what you have to do.”

And with that, Donna knew.

There was no going back to a normal life, not for her.

**Author's Note:**

> So I hope you guys liked this. I got the idea shortly after writing the previous section of this series and finally made the decision to turn it into a series. You'll see how and why this is relevant later.


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